THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE
Number 707, February 3, 2013Government kills. Government steals.Government kidnaps. Government enslaves.Government lies. Government is vastlyworse than anything or anybody it wascreated to protect us from.

I've had no additional commentary on Part 1 or Part 2 since the Part 2
publication, and there have been no significant new developments in
terms of the President's executive orders on "gun control,"
including actual publication of the text which he signed.
(Impeachable offenses and simple disgraceful performance by other
officials at the recent hearings on the subject are not the subject
of this series of articles). So I will continue from my point of
departure in Part 1, but continue the numbering from point 6 since
the bulk of Part 2 is (unnumbered) point 5.

This item has been in the news this week because a Federal appeals
court has just found these recess appointments to be unconstitutional
because they violate the Separation of Powers — which fact was
known to the President, and ignored, when he issued them.i
It goes without saying that if a Republican President had done that,
the Democrats in the Senate — and the Media — would be
calling for his impeachment; so the same should be applied to
President Obama. Mr. Kerpen's review of the situationii
notes that, as I lamented in the introduction to Part 2, "White
House Press Secretary Jay Carney insisted the decision 'does not have
any impact, as I think the NLRB has already put out, on their
operations or functions, or on the board itself.' So the
administration is openly defying the courts and the Constitution."

In other words, the President is denying that even the declaration
that his action was illegal should have any impact on the
consequences of that action. That in and of itself should also be
grounds for impeachment.

7. The Invasion of Libya: Violation of the War Powers Act

These examples are all very straightforward and have been very publicly
visible; this one is no different. The President authorized military
force to support the rebels in Libya against its late president
Moammar Gadhafi. He not only refused to get Congressional approval
for this action, but he refused to account to Congress when they
asked him for such accounting. Another example of defiance of the
Constitutional division of powers, and another example of the
Democrat-led Senate's refusal to hold him to account.

There is not yet any evidence that this action has accrued any benefit to
the United States — and the death of the Ambassador in Benghazi
suggests that the President's actions have been harmful to the United
States in the long term. There is little doubt that the President has
given "aid and comfort to an enemy" — the plan to
give fighter jets and Abrams tanks to the Moslem Brotherhood regime
in Egypt being another immediate example.

8. Immigration.

This isn't a screed on the legitimacy of our present immigration system and on those who
enter the United States outside of the system.iii
The fact remains that we have immigration laws, laws that the
citizens of the country want to have enforced, and that Congress
therefore cannot change, but that presidents of both parties have
chosen to ignore. Whether or not anyone agrees with that law, it
remains the law; there is no dispute that Congress has the power "to
establish an uniform rule of Naturalization," and that the
President is obligated to enforce that law. In two particulars, the
President has failed to do so:

a) The President (and Attorney General) have worked to prohibit the State of Arizona
from enforcing an immigration provision equivalent to the present US
law, even though otherwise the state has areas which are virtually
lawless due to the activities of drug gangs.iv

Whether or not you agree with current immigration law, the President has no
constitutional ability to unilaterally rewrite the law for his
personal, political benefit.

Terence James Mason is the author of No Loopholes: Getting Back to
Basics, an assessment of the meaning of the Bill of Rights and a
suggestion of additional Constitutional Amendments to restore the
Framer's vision for the Republic. No Loopholes is
electronically published by Twilight Times Books
(http://twilighttimesbooks.com)
in Kindle, Nook, and other popular electronic formats. Mason tweets
on the need for #NoLoopholes @OneAmericanVoice. Web site:
www.oneamericanvoice.me.

Notes

i I also must wonder what constitutional
authority justifies a National Labor Relations Board to which the
President makes appointments in the first place, but the fact that
such officials were appointed without the required Congressional
approval certainly does nothing to add further legitimacy to the
process.

iii Regarding immigration, in brief I
believe: (a) The borders should be controlled sufficiently to
reduce the risk of terrorists (or, if you will, “all them
undocumented combatants in an undeclared war”) entering the
United States with weapons of mass destruction; (b) otherwise,
people should be relatively free to come and go, for work or for
play, and at will, (c) but with no expectation that they will
receive any preferences relative to other immigrants or citizens
(including government "handouts" or relief from taxes due
to "working under the table"), and (d) with the same "path
to citizenship" for all immigrants. My objection to illegal
immigration is not at all racial; it's the fact that illegal
immigrants don't contribute taxes and then demand government
services paid for by my taxes: either make them pay, or let me have
a tax holiday too. Equal treatment for all, not preferential
treatment for those whose votes are for sale.

iv One also does not have to be a fan of
current drug laws to recognize and recoil from the savage
lawlessness of the drug gangs. Much may be said of the value of
de-fanging them by ending the second failed prohibition experiment.
But again, the drug controls are laws the President is enjoined to
enforce — and is failing to do so.